Multiple Echo and Sonos - play everywhere not an option

I have 4 echos in my house grouped to the “everywhere” group through Alexa. I added my Sonos Play 1 and it works fine by itself with any simple alexa commands. However, I tried to add my Sonos speaker to my everywhere group but it doesn’t seem like this is an option. Can anybody tell me if I can play my music on ALL of my echo devices AND my Sonos at the same time? If I can’t add Sonos speakers to the everywhere group along with my Echo devices, I’m less likely to purchase an additional Sonos like I planned. Isn’t the whole point to be able to play music in all the speakers at the same time?

I am in exactly the same boat - was waiting to outfit the house with Sonos speakers to use in conjunction with the two Echos and Dot / Amp we have setup. Hope the ability to have a mixed group is in the cards.

I would not count on it. The ability to sync between Sonos units is a carefully kept trade secret, protected by patents. I doubt very much they would give away the farm so Amazon could sell cheap versions that will sync with Sonos.

Difficult for people who already have a few Sonos speakers. But it probably looks like a better idea to buy the Google Max speaker or wait and see if the new Echos have decent enough sound

I'm not following how the inability to mix and match echo and sonos speakers means that people would be better served with a google max. You can't mix and match sonos with google speakers, nor do I think google does mutliroom audio (do they? I don't know).

Peronsally, I opted for echo dots, because I never ended to use them as speakers with decent sound quality. I did get full size echos for my kids room where I had little use for syncing audio with the rest of the house. If you have a house full of echos and sonos, then wherever you want good mutiroom audio, use sonos. Control with a dot if you have one, or full echo if you have one and don't have anther good use for it. For rooms where sound quality isn't as important, nor is multiroom (with the sonos part of the house), then use echos. I don't see why google is the answer either way...unless you have no sonos or echos and really like google.

Aside....at the moment, I'm trying to justify why I 'need' a Sonos One...or maybe one of those new Echo Spots.

Okay guys... this is complicated since now we're dealing with two services, and trying to get them to play together. But since it's still in Beta right now, and very early in its use, it's a little complicated, but can be done.

First, everyone needs to continue to submit comments, suggestions, and everything to both the SONOS support group, as well as the Amazon support group to make sure both are always on top of things to better the entire service for all.

But with that said, if your SONOS devices have been discovered in the Alexa app, then ask Alexa to play music in one of the newly-discovered room. Once music is playing in there on that individual SONOS device, you'll need to then go into your SONOS app. From within the new SONOS app, select the room with the song playing from the Echo device, and click the room name at the bottom of the display to bring up a list of all rooms. Then click the "on" switch for Everywhere. Then click "Done" on the bottom of the screen.

This process even works across my SONOS Connect, my Play speakers, as well as my Playbase.
You can send all of the commands (volume up, volume down, skip, etc...) to any of the Alexa devices, and it's smart enough to know that you have music playing in one of the new connected devices, and performs that.

Hopefully, this gets everyone to finally be able to start enjoying both Alexa and SONOS!

The only thing I can say that is the negative in this process (since we're mixing services), is that you can't add SONOS to the Everywhere group.

Please, whoever decides to get the new SONOS one speaker (Play 1 with Alexa), can you update this channel with your findings, if the new SONOS device then gets added to the Everywhere group, thus allowing you to then control all Alexa and SONOS in the same group? That would be awesome if it finally allows it!

I was excited to receive my Sonos One on the 24th, but if I can’t do multiroom audio with it AND my existing echos together it’s getting returned. I have never had a Sonos speaker before and was excited but this is a dal breaker. Some info from the company would be helpful.

@Adam, I don't think that's a solution to what other's wanted, which was to have their echo speakers and Sonos speakes all play in sync.

@rlreif Sonos One is an Alexa Enabled device, it's not an echo. Only echo's will play music insync. Firetv's and Fire tablets are also Alexa enabled devices, and they will not play in sync with your echo's, even though they are all Amazon products. That could change, but that's the way it is right now.

Whether that functionality will be available in the future is not known, though it most definitely is not possible now, and that is not Sonos' doing. The Amazon SDK for that type of functionality is not available till next year:

Alexa Voice Service (AVS) Multi-Room Music SDK

Amazon is introducing new tools that enable AVS device makers to integrate with Amazon Alexa Multi-Room Music. Doing so will allow customers to play their music across supported Echo and AVS devices—for example, a customer with three Echo devices and two standalone AVS speakers can play synchronized music across all five devices. These tools will be available early next year.

Keeping all my existing echos and maybe adding another. I already have my house full of them, and was hoping the new Sonos could be added to that group to give me great sound there, but I’m not going to add an incompatible device to the mix, or trash what I have and go all in on Sonos. Maybe in the future if this is resolved I will reorder, but for now it doesn’t meet my needs unfortunately.

Understandable. But the audio quality of the Sonos really is far superior, if that matters to you. I personally never listen to music on my Echo; compared to even the smallest Sonos, the sound is terrible.

Agree on this. If sound quality isn't that important to you, and whole house audio on a budget is your priority, then going all echo's is probably the right choice for you.

And that completely makes sense regarding wanting to maintain your existing system. I find myself with a lot of interest in the Sonos One and in some of the new echo products. However, my house is filled with both already, and I would either need to replace products that work fine already, or create new needs in my house....somehow.

I am in the same boat as rlreif. Not having the ability to put the Sonos One and the Echos into the same group is a deal breaker. I was looking forward to having the Sonos sound quality in the room I'm in the most often with the Echos providing it in other rooms. Sonos should quickly state their intention to provide having the One and Echos in the same group. If they don't I'm returning the unit.

I feel Sonos was dishonest in their advertising of the One. Saying the One has Alexa implies it will work like Alexa on the Echo. With Amazon just recently adding the multi-room music made it likely people will assume the One can go into a group.

Grouping all your speakers and controlling them with Alexa can actually be done but requires a Harmony hub and remote (at least it’s the only way I know of). I have a Harmony activity set up with my 5 Play1’s and Soundbar and when I tell Alexa to “play Sonos” my last playlist plays on all my speakers. If you have different playlists set up in harmony you can control them with Alexa well. I also have the Sonos skill set up so once the music is playing I can control my speakers using the Sonos voice commands. This is not perfect and commands are limitedso I am really looking forward to Sonos’s ultimate solution but it’s better than nothing.

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